Gamers Better at Driving w/ Cell Phones?

sl4shd0rk writes "A lot of people think talking on the cell phone while driving is natural, but each time someone asks a question or changes the subject, it's like taking on a new task, Psychologists who study multi-tasking have argued for years about whether these "information bottlenecks" occur because people are inherently lazy, or because they have a fundamental inability to switch from one task to another. Mei-Ching Lien, an assistant professor of psychology at Oregon State University. "Even with a seemingly simple task, structural cognitive limitations can prevent you from efficiently switching to a new task." I have to say that the best ones are those who play a lot of video games," she pointed out. "Those are lab studies, however, and not driving tests." " All I know is that I could get where I was going better if I could shoot turtles at others on the highway.

Comments

There is a way...

[roman_mir]

It is possible to talk on the phone and drive. The trick is simple: you must make concentrating on the road your priority. What I mean is this: you must actively THINK that you are driving. Talking on the cell becomes of much lesser priority. If something interrupts your normal driving pattern just drop the phone instantly, just put 100% of all your capacities to the road. For example if someone cuts you off too damn close, you must act as if there is no cell phone in your hand. I admit, sometimes I drive that way. Of-course I prefer not to be on the phone while driving, but you can't do much about it. We spend too much time driving, there is no surprise that people talk on the phone, this is inevitable.

Unfortunately almost all people don't do it that way. For some strange reason they concentrate on the phone call and view their driving as the secondary task. This leads to accidents. Probably everyone who drives (myself included,) have witnessed someone doing something incredibly stupid while on the phone.

I actually think talking on the phone while driving should become part of the driving test. We can't stop people from talking on the phone. Really. They will use hands-free devices and no police will be able to enforce a law like that. So we must TEACH people to do it right. Part of the course and exam must include a person calling the driver, while the teacher/examiner observe the driver's behaviour. The driver must learn to pay 95% of his attention to the road, to observe the traffic laws AND follow them and to drive in real traffic conditions without endangering the rest of the world by their behaviour. They should be taught to drop the phone conversation instantly, I mean in a hundred of a millisecond and completely concentrate on the road if they feel that a dangerous situation is coming up. But this will probably prohibit many people from driving at all, but you know what? Then you should have an extra configuration in your driver's license: Did not pass drive while talking exam. The penalties for driving and talking and causing an accident should be extra-severe for these people.

I had an accident about 4 years ago (and no, I wasn't on the phone,) a fender-bender. Also I spun out of control once (I behaved stupidely, made a very sharp turn at a very high velocity) didn't hit anything but after a 270 turn both rear wheels went into a ditch. After these 2 incidents I have developed some kind of a reflex, when I stop paying attention to the road for even a millisecond, a scene plays in my mind: I FEEL like I am crashing into something HARD. I feel it with every cell in my body and it forces me to start paying fullest attention again. I am telling you, this feeling prevented me from doing quite a few stupid things and probably from a few accidents (I almost never go with the speed limit though, I always go at least 25% faster.) But you can't develop this reflex from instructions, unfortunately you have to go through bad things a couple of times to have it automatically. It's unpleasant to feel this, but if it saves me from an accident I am just glad that I have it.